Once in a Lifetime
by amber3234
Summary: Weeks after Brian and Olivia broke up, they are forced to sit at the same table at the NYPD gala. What will come out of this? Little one-shot following their breakup.


**Hey guys, I had a random one shot idea that I thought I would try out. I know I have to update Adversity and I promise I am trying to get on that. It's hard to write a fanfic now that Bensidy broke up )': but this idea just popped into my head. It didn't turn out exactly how I wanted but, oh well, I hope you still enjoy it. Please let me know what you think. Sorry for any mistakes.**

**Follow me on twitter: amber3234**

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Olivia stood in front of the full length mirror getting ready for the NYPD annual gala. They were all forced to go and had no way of getting out of it. She had tried all the excuses in the book.

She zipped up her dress and smiled at her reflection, liking how the dress turned out.

Olivia and Amanda decided to go dress shopping together during their lunch break since they had no other time to find dresses.

Olivia had picked out a long strapless red dress that hugged her in all the right places. It showed some cleavage that wasn't too much but, it was just right.

Her hair had grown a little over the last month. It fell in curls just past her shoulders. Her makeup was more than usual but, not too much to where she looked fake. It was right in between her natural beauty and a little help from the makeup.

Olivia smoothed her hands over her dress and sighed deeply.

Today was the first day she would see Brian in a month.

The funny thing is that Brian and his partner, Kyle, were set to sit at SVU's table. Olivia and Brian had submitted the seating requests while they were still together.

She wasn't going to lie; she was kind of excited to see Brian. She was also very nervous.

The last time they had talked was after Lewis took his own life. Brian was quick to be by her side as soon as he had heard what happened. He insisted on staying with her for the night but, she had refused. She let him hold her and comfort her but, she knew that letting him stay the night would be too much for her.

Brian had stayed with his brother since the night they had broken up. He officially moved out the week after.

The week Lewis had escaped from prison.

That had been four weeks ago. They hadn't seen or even spoken to each other since then.

Olivia heard her phone ringing from the living room. She grabbed her clutch and walked over to grab her phone.

Seeing Nick's name appear across the screen, she answered. "Hey, Nick."

"Liv, I'm on my way to pick you up. You ready?"

"Yeah, I'm ready."

"Ok see you in 10 minutes."

"See you then." She hung up and put on her shoes.

Nick had arrived in 10 minutes, as promised.

She opened the door and smiled at the look on his face. "Hey."

"Wow Liv, you look amazing."

She smiled. "Thanks. You don't look so bad yourself."

"You ready to get this over with?"

She nodded. "I guess so."

"I can't believe we have to go to this stupid thing. I would rather be working," Nick whined.

"I hear ya. We'll find an excuse to leave early," she told him.

Nick laughed. "Sounds good."

They arrived at the gala around 7 pm and found Fin, Rollins, Barba, and Murphy at their table. They said their hellos and sat down. Olivia sat in between Fin and Nick, making sure to be on the opposite side of the two vacant seats that would soon be occupied by Brian and his partner.

~SVU~

Olivia was so into her conversation with Fin that she didn't realize Brian and his partner had arrived until she saw the rest of her table stand up to greet them.

Olivia followed their lead and stood up as well. She didn't know how to greet her ex-boyfriend, who she hadn't seen or talked to in a month.

Brian made his way over to her and gave her a quick hug.

"You look beautiful." Brian smiled.

"Thanks," she replied, feeling her cheeks begin to flush.

"This is my partner, Kyle. Kyle, this is Olivia," Brian introduced.

"Oh, so this is Olivia. I've heard a lot of great things. It's nice to finally meet you." Kyle extended his hand out to hers.

Olivia smiled at Brian then politely shook Kyle's hand. "It's nice to meet you too."

They all sat down and starting mingling with one another.

Nick leaned over to Olivia. "You good?" he whispered in her ear.

Olivia casted a glance over at him. "I'll be fine." She smiled and turned to look at Brian, who was looking right back at her.

He quickly looked away when she caught his eye.

Olivia looked down at her phone. They had only been there for half an hour and she was already counting down the minutes until it was over.

It felt strange, sitting across from Brian and not being able to talk to him the way she used to. The way she used to when they were together. Now it felt like they were two strangers in the same room.

The gala had officially started. They sat through a few boring speeches. They listened to speeches of people trying to be funny and the audience politely laughing along.

Brian groaned and stood up. "I'm going to the bar, anyone want a drink?"

Some of them told him their drinks orders and the others simply shook their heads.

Brian looked over at Olivia. "Liv?"

She looked over at him. "No, thanks."

"I'll go with you," Fin told him.

When they came back, they handed everyone their drinks.

Brian set a glass down in front of Olivia. He knew she always loved a glass of red wine.

He shrugged. "It'll help get you through this thing," he joked.

Olivia smiled. "Thanks," she said as she took a small sip.

~SVU~

Olivia and Amanda went over to mingle with a few detectives they recognized.

Olivia walked over to the bar for another drink.

As she was waiting for her drink, she felt a tap on her shoulder.

"Olivia?" she heard a familiar male voice.

She turned around and grinned instantly. "Jeff!"

"Wow, I can't believe it. It's been so long," Jeff said as he took her in a hug.

"I know. How've you been? What precinct are you at?"

The bartender handed Olivia her drink but, she was too preoccupied with the man standing in front of her.

"I was at Narcotics and just recently transferred to Homicide.

"You're still at SVU?"

"Yeah, where else would I fit in?" she joked.

They talked and caught up for about fifteen minutes before exchanging numbers.

"It was so good to see you. I'll call you soon and we'll set up dinner or something." He leaned over and hugged her.

"Sounds good."

Olivia walked back to their table and found that they all rearranged their seats to talk to one another. That left the only empty seat next to Brian.

She reluctantly sat down next to him and saw the scowl on his face.

He kept his attention on Fin, who he had been having a conversation with when had she arrived at the table.

A few minutes after Brian and Fin's conversation, Brian still hadn't said anything to her.

She didn't know why. He seemed fine with her the whole time and now he didn't even acknowledge her presence.

"You okay?" she leaned over and asked him.

"I'm fine." He didn't even look at her.

Olivia nodded and looked away.

~SVU~

Olivia was pissed. Every time anyone else would talk, Brian seemed engaged and interested but, when she would talk, he would act like she wasn't there.

Nick noticed the tension and looked over at Olivia.

When she looked back at him, he silently asked if she was okay.

Olivia nodded at Nick, understanding his silent question.

Dinner had arrived a few minutes later. Everyone involved themselves in the conversations going on around the table but, Olivia had stayed quiet.

Once dinner was done, Olivia excused herself to go to the restroom. As she stood in front of the mirror, fixing her makeup, she heard the door open. She looked to her right to find Amanda walking in.

"Hey, you okay?" Amanda asked.

Amanda and Olivia weren't exactly that close but, she looked up to Olivia and considered her a friend.

"Yeah," Olivia replied as she reapplied her lipstick.

"I'm so ready to leave. I don't think I can handle another speech," Amanda tried.

Olivia laughed. "Trust me; I don't think any of us can."

"I swear I saw Fin sleeping with his eyes open," Amanda joked.

"Hey, at least we look good though. Your dress turned out amazing. Brian is probably squirming in his seat."

Olivia looked over at her and smiled. "Yeah, I don't think so."

"Oh, come on he's been eyeing you all night long."

Olivia didn't respond to that. She simply put her lipstick into her clutch and looked at Amanda. "We should head back."

They headed back and Olivia took her seat next to Brian.

When he didn't make an attempt to talk to her, she leaned into him. "Can we talk outside?" she whispered, seeing as everyone on their table wasn't paying attention to them. The last thing she wanted was to argue with Brian in front of her squad.

Brian briefly looked over at her. "There's nothing to talk about." Then he looked away.

Olivia let out an annoyed sigh. "Stop being a dick, Brian. We both agreed to this," she said, referring to their break up.

He turned back to her. "No, you wanted this. I told you we were having problems but, I never wanted to end this."

"Well you didn't waste any time moving out."

They both decided to move out of the apartment, not wanting the memory of it after their breakup. Brian seemed like he couldn't move out fast enough. A week later he had officially moved out. It took Olivia three weeks to find another place and another two weeks to move. She had stayed in their apartment alone for 5 weeks. He stayed with his brother that week before he found a place even though she told him she didn't mind him staying there with her.

"You were so quick to break up instead of fix our problems so it seemed pretty obvious that you didn't want me around," he retaliated, then stood up and left the table.

Olivia rolled her eyes and looked over to catch Nick's watchful eye. She gave him a weak smile to which he returned. Nick could tell they got into an argument just by their expressions.

Brian walked over to his squad, who all stood talking by the bar. He seemed to really friendly with them for only being there for a couple of months. Olivia saw a women approaching them, guessing she worked with them since they all seemed to know her. The woman was standing a little too close to Brian for Olivia's liking. She saw as the women said something which made Brian laugh. Olivia wasn't a jealous person but, after how cold he was to her and seeing how warm he was towards this woman, upset her.

"He's just trying to get back at you for talking to that guy at the bar," Nick explained, quietly.

She turned to Nick. "What?"

"Brian saw you talking to some guy and now he's talking to her to make you jealous."

Now she knew why Brian had been upset with her. She knew how it probably looked to Brian. Hugging Jeff and exchanging numbers.

~SVU~

The last part of the gala was the award giving. They were handing out pointless awards that none of them were paying attention to. It was all just background noise to them.

Olivia took Brian's hand under the table. "Let's go outside. Get some fresh air. Talk," she whispered.

She felt Brian gently squeeze her hand which made her smile. He was the first to stand up, his hand still connected with hers. Everyone at the table looked as they both stood up.

"We'll be outside," Brian announced.

He led Olivia outside and let go of her hand.

They stood there in silence just staring at each other, not knowing what to say.

"I'm sorry if you felt that I didn't want you around," Olivia broke the silence. "I just thought that was what you wanted."

Brian shook his head. "What would make you think that?"

She shrugged. "We barely spent time together those last few months and when we did, all we did was fight."

"Every couple fights."

Olivia took a deep breath. "Brian, we were fighting all the time. The last thing I want to come home to after a hard day at work is another stupid fight. And that's when you actually decided to come home."

"You should know better than anyone how unpredictable my job is. There were plenty of nights when you didn't come home either so don't put all the blame on me," he said, getting frustrated.

She nodded and looked down. He was right. It was both of their faults that this relationship failed. "You're right. We didn't put enough effort into our relationship as we did our jobs. Both of us."

When Brian didn't reply for a while, she spoke, "He was just an old friend from the academy."

Brian furrowed his eyebrows.

"The guy at the bar," she explained further.

He looked down. "You can talk to whoever you want, Olivia," he lied. Of course he didn't want her talking to another guy but, they weren't together anymore and he had no say in that.

"I know I can. You can too but, we're still allowed to get jealous," she said, referring to the woman he was talking to earlier that night.

Brian knew she saw him talking to the woman at the bar. He did it purposely to get back at her. "She's one of my coworkers. She's happily married," Brian explained.

Olivia smiled and nodded. "He's gay," she admitted. It was nice to know Brian still got jealous because it showed that he still cares.

Brian returned her smile. "I wanted to kill him."

She laughed stroked his cheek. "You have nothing to worry about."

"No?"

She shook her head. "No." She dropped her hand. "I can't imagine being with anyone else."

Brian's face straightened. "Liv, I don't want to be with anyone else." He took her hands and held them in his, against his chest. "I've been miserable for the past few weeks. We didn't give us a try fifteen years ago and that's always been one of my biggest regrets. I don't want to regret this. I don't want to look back and regret not trying harder for us. I love you, Liv. I can't go another second without you. You make me happy, whether we're fighting or not. I'm the happiest when I'm around you."

Olivia felt the tears forming in her eyes. "I missed you, so much. I'm sorry for not trying harder. I should've fought for us but, instead I just ran away as usual. I can't imagine being with anyone else. I don't want to be with anyone else but you, Brian. I want to try again, for real this time." He wiped the single tear that fell from her eyes.

"Are you sure this is what you really want, Olivia? Because I don't think I can handle you breaking my heart for a third time." Brian smiled.

"I'm positive but, we need to try and make more time for each other. I don't want to go back to not seeing or talking to each other for days at a time."

Brian gave her a gently kiss on her forehead and held her close. "Me either. I promise to make more time for you."

Olivia nodded in his chest. She looked up at him. "Maybe we should take things slow this time. I don't think we should move back in with each other until our relationship is back on track."

"I think that's what's best for both of us," he agreed.

"I love you."

"I love you too." He gently grabbed her face and captured her lips with his.

Their kiss was interrupted when they heard the doors open and saw Olivia's colleagues walking out.

They all smiled, seeing that the two had made up.

"Let's all head home. I'm sure you two wouldn't mind," Fin joked towards Brian and Olivia.

Olivia laughed and rolled her eyes as they all began to walk away.

"C'mon, I'll take you home." Brian held her hand and led her to his car.

"Your apartment or mine?" he questioned.

"Mine's closer," Olivia answered with a smile.

Brian smirked.

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**Sorry it kind of ended so blah but, I couldn't think of a way to end it. Anyways, hope you guys liked it and please review :D**


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